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The Moldovan Parliament Issued a Political Statement Condemning Media Attacks Launched Through Russian Televisions

08 February 2018
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At the first meeting of the 2018 spring session on Thursday, February 8, the Parliament of Moldova voted on a statement “condemning the attacks of the Russian Federation against the national information security and abusive interference in the political life in Moldova.” Votes for approval of the statement were cast by MPs representing the Democratic Party (DPM), the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPM), the Liberal Party (LP), and the European Popular Parliamentary Group (EPPG), as well as by independent MPs. The parliamentary groups of the Party of Socialists and the Party of Communists criticized the document and left the plenary parliament meeting before voting.
 
The text of the statement was presented by the Democratic Party MP Sergiu Sarbu. Among other things, the authors of the statement – a group of MPs from the Democratic Party, the European Popular Parliamentary Group and independent MPs – expressed their “concern about the intensification of attacks against the information security of our country from the Russian Federation, launched through some Russian televisions and some Moldovan media outlets.”
 
MPs also pointed out the negative practices of Russian propaganda and referred to international monitoring reports and to the reports of social society, which note an alarming growth of propaganda. “Moldova has lately become a practice ground for the Russian Federation’s hybrid war against neighbors. Therefore, we need to pay much more attention to the information war that is waged against our country,” said Eugen Carpov, the president of the European Popular Parliamentary Group.
 
LDPM MP Maria Ciobanu objected to DPM MPs that the media holding that is controlled by the DPM president Vladimir Plahotniuc continues retransmitting programs from the Russian Federation.
 
Please note that in December 2017 the Parliament adopted the anti-propaganda law, which prohibits retransmission on the territory of Moldova of information and analysis programs created in the countries that had not ratified the European Convention on Transfrontier Television, the Russian Federation being one of them. Moscow had a harsh reaction, qualifying the vote of Moldovan MPs as “a new anti-Russian attack.” Moldovan MPs find the statement of the Russian State Duma “unfounded.”